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Robert Louis Stevenson > A Child’s Garden of Verses and Underwoods > X. Their Laureate to an Academy Class Dinner Club |
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| CONTENTS · BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD |
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| Stevenson, Robert Louis (1850–1894). A Child’s Garden of Verses and Underwoods. 1913. |
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X. Their Laureate to an Academy Class Dinner Club
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| DEAR Thamson class, whaure’er I gang | |
| It aye comes ower me wi’ a spang: | |
| “Lordsake! they Thamson lads—(deil hang | |
| Or else Lord mend them)!— | |
| An’ that wanchancy annual sang | 5 |
| I ne’er can send them!” | |
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| Straucht, at the name, a trusty tyke, | |
| My conscience girrs ahint the dyke; | |
| Straucht on my hinderlands I fyke | |
| To find a rhyme t’ ye; | 10 |
| Pleased—although mebbe no pleased-like— | |
| To gie my time t’ ye. | |
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| “Weel,” an’ says you, wi’ heavin’ breist, | |
| “Sae far, sae guid, but what’s the neist? | |
| Yearly we gaither to the feast, | 15 |
| A’ hopefü’ men— | |
| Yearly we skelloch ‘Hang the beast— | |
| Nae sang again!”’ | |
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| My lads, an’ what am I to say? | |
| Ye shürely ken the Muse’s way: | 20 |
| Yestreen, as gleg’s a tyke—the day, | |
| Thrawn like a cuddy: | |
| Her conduc’, that to her’s a play, | |
| Deith to a body. | |
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| Aft whan I sat an’ made my mane, | 25 |
| Aft whan I laboured burd-alane, | |
| Fishin’ for rhymes an’ findin’ nane, | |
| Or nane were fit for ye— | |
| Ye judged me cauld’s a chucky stane— | |
| No car’n a bit for ye! | 30 |
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| But saw ye ne’er some pingein’ bairn | |
| As weak as a pitaty-par’n’— | |
| Less üsed wi’ guidin’ horse-shoe airn | |
| Than steerin’ crowdie— | |
| Packed aff his lane, by moss an’ cairn, | 35 |
| To ca’ the howdie. | |
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| Wae’s me, for the puir callant than! | |
| He wambles like a poke o’ bran, | |
| An’ the lowse rein as hard’s he can, | |
| Pu’s, trem’lin’ handit; | 40 |
| Till, blaff! upon his hinderlan’ | |
| Behauld him landit. | |
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| Sic-like—I awn the weary fac’— | |
| Whan on my muse the gate I tak, | |
| An’ see her gleed e’e raxin’ back | 45 |
| To keek ahint her;— | |
| To me, the brig o’ Heev’n gangs black | |
| As blackest winter. | |
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| “Lordsake! we’re aff,” thinks I, “but whaur? | |
| On what abhorred an’ whinny scaur, | 50 |
| Or whammled in what sea o’ glaur, | |
| Will she desert me? | |
| An’ will she just disgrace? or waur— | |
| Will she no burt me?” | |
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| Kittle the quaere! But at least | 55 |
| The day I’ve backed the fashious beast, | |
| While she, wi’ mony a spang an’ reist, | |
| Flang heels ower bonnet; | |
| An’ a’ triumphant—for your feast, | |
| Hae! there’s your sonnet! | 60 |
